'Cannes' is cliched cinema

By PAULA NECHAK, SPECIAL TO THE POST-INTELLIGENCER

Published 9:00 pm, Thursday, March 14, 2002

It's not surprising writer/director Henry Jaglom, a sort of poor man's Woody Allen, would find the Cannes Film Festival a source of inspiration. The scene suits his penchant for gathering a group of strangers, friends and acquaintances, putting them through the wringer of love, business and breakups, then tossing the die as to who winds up with whom.

While easier to sit through than most of Jaglom's self-conscious and gratingly irritating films, it's still tainted by cliches, painful improbability and murky points. But the presence of French legend Anouk Aimee, in a lovely, gravitous turn, makes it nearly palatable.

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Actress Alice Palmer (Greta Scacchi), hoping to find financing for her script about an older woman's spiritual awakening, is approached by a shady stranger (Zack Norman), who promises to raise the money.

But there's a catch -- Alice must use actress Millie Marquand (Aimee) in the lead. She doesn't know there's a big name producer who also is pursuing Marquand. Complicating matters is Millie's beloved, estranged director husband (Maximilian Schell), who advises her on every career move even while he cheats on her, and the stage is set for the usual roundelay of complications, miscommunication and lost and found love.

Jaglom tosses in a clunky subplot about a young ingenue (Jenny Gabrielle) that makes moot his pontifications about how women over 40 are treated in the film business.